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The Mason Title and Its 

Relations to New Hampshire 

and Massachusetts 



BY 



OTIS GRANT HAMMOND 



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The Mason Title and Its 

Relations to New Hampshire 

and Massachusetts 

BY 
OTIS GRANT HAMMOND 



RaPBINTCD FBOU THE PROCEEDINGS OF THE AMERICAN ANTIQUARIAN SOCIKTT 

FOB October, 1916. 



WORCESTER, MASSACHUSETTS, U. S. A. 

PUBLISHED BY THE SOCIETY 

1916 



THE DAVIS PRESS 

Worcester, Massachusetts 



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THE MASON TITLE AND ITS RELATIONS 

TO NEW HAMPSHIRE AND 

MASSACHUSETTS 



BY OTIS GRANT HAMMOND 



The history of the Mason grant is founded upon 
confusion and obscurity. All the various grants to 
Mason and Gorges, or to Capt. John Mason alone, 
emanated from the "Council Established at Ply- 
mouth in the County of Devon for the Planting, Rul- 
ing, Ordering, and Governing of New England in 
America," which in common usage was called the 
Council of Plymouth, itself a confessed failure after 
only fifteen years of aimless, floundering existence. 
On the 3rd of November, 1620, the Council received 
from King James a grant of all the territory in America 
from the fortieth to the forty-eighth degree of norther- 
ly latitude, and extending from sea to sea. 

The grants from the Council of Plymouth in which 
Capt. John Mason was interested are, briefly, as 
follows : 

The grant of Mariana to John Mason Mar. 9, 1621- 
2, comprised the territory between the Naumkeag 
and Merrimack rivers, bounded on the west by a 
straight line connecting the sources of the two rivers. 

The grant of Maine to Sir Ferdinando Gorges and 
Capt. John Mason Aug. 10, 1622, included the tract 
between the Merrimack and the Sagadahock rivers, 
and extending sixty miles inland. 

The grant of New Hampshire to Capt. John Mason 
Nov. 7, 1629, comprised the territory between the 
Merrimack and the Piscataqua rivers, extending to 



the head of each, and from the head of the Pisca- 
taqua, "northwestwards," and from the head of the 
Merrimack "forward up into y^ land Westwards" 
until a distance of sixty miles from the sea had been 
reached on each course, and these limits to be con- 
nected by a line forming a westerly bound. These 
descriptions indicate the general courses of the two 
rivers as then understood, the Merrimack as flowing 
out of the west, and the Piscataqua from the north- 
west. 

The grant of Laconia to Sir Ferdinando Gorges and 
Capt. John Mason Nov. 17, 1629, comprised an inland 
tract of land of very indefinite bounds, being described 
as all that land bordering on the river and lake of the 
Iroquois for a depth of ten miles to the south and 
east, westward half way to the next great lake, and 
north to the main river running from the Great Lakes 
into the River of Canada. It was intended that this 
grant should convey a tract of land lying in back of 
the Maine grant of 1622. The Lake of the Iroquois 
was probably Lake Champlain, but this grant was 
never even located. 

The grant of Piscataqua Nov. 3, 1631, to Gorges 
and Mason, with their associates, John Cotton, Henry 
Gardner, George Griffith, Edwin Guy, Thomas 
Wannerton, Thomas Eyre, and EleazerEyre, conveyed 
the settlement already begun at Piscataqua and 
extending north to the Hilton Patent, with a consider- 
able area to the south and west, very indefinitely and 
obscurely described. 

Mason was elected a member of the Council of 
Plymouth in June, 1632, and in November following 
he became Vice-President, the Presidency being held 
by the Earl of Warwick. The work of the Council 
towards the settlement of New England was by this 
time clearly unsatisfactory. Their knowledge of 
the territory they held was very meager, and their 
grants were indefinite and unsuccessful. The mem- 
bers themselves became convinced of their futility 



as a corporation organized for the development of 
the new world. Their enemies were numerous in 
both New and Old England, and they determined to 
divide their lands among themselves as far as possible, 
and to return their corporate powers to the King. 
In pursuance of this policy the Council, on the 18th 
of April, 1635, gave a lease of New Hampshire and 
Masonia to John Wollaston of London, goldsmith, a 
brother-in-law of Mason, for 3000 years, in accord- 
ance with an agreement with Mason. New Hamp- 
shire was described as extending from the Naumkeag 
to the Newichwannock rivers, and sixty miles inland, 
and Masonia was a 10,000 acre tract at the mouth of 
the Sagadahock. 

Four days later, Apr. 22, 1635, the same lands were 
granted to Mason, these grants also being made in 
accordance with an agreement made February 3 of 
the same year. On the 11th of June following, 
Wollaston transferred his lease to Mason, whose title 
was thus doubled, and later in the same month the 
Council of Plymouth surrendered its charter to the 
King. 

Capt. John Mason died late in 1635, and his will 
was dated November 26 of that year. He devised 
his province of New Hampshire to his grandson, John 
Tufton, on condition that he should take the name of 
Mason, and if he should die without issue the lands 
were to go to his brother, Robert Tufton, on the same 
condition. These were the sons of Mason's only 
child, Ann, who married Joseph Tufton. 

John Tufton Mason did die without issue, and 
Robert Tufton became the heir, taking the name of 
Mason. Robert did not, however, come of lawful 
age until 1650. Capt. John Mason's widow had no 
interest in the province, and expressly notified Ma- 
son's agents in New Hampshire that she should take 
no care of the settlement, and that the tenants must 
manage affairs themselves. 

Captain Mason was enthusiastic over his properties 



in the new world, and spent time, energy, and money 
without limit in the effort to establish a permanent 
settlement that should be not only a source of wealth 
to himself, but a principality, hereditary in his family, 
which should thereby forever perpetuate his name. 
Before his death he had sent over about seventy 
settlers, besides tradesmen, with an ample supply 
of provisions, clothing, utensils, arms, and ammuni- 
tion, and artillery for fortifications which were to be 
built. These colonists had entered upon a settlement 
at Piscataqua, built houses, cleared lands, and made 
large improvements. Cattle had also been sent over, 
a Danish breed, which is said to be still perceptible 
in some parts of New England. A settlement was 
established also on another plantation at Newich- 
wannock, where two mills, the first in New England, 
and other buildings for habitation and defense had 
been erected. Altogether Captain Mason had ex- 
pended on his province about £22,000 sterling, and 
in a letter to his agent, Ambrose Gibbons, in 1634 he 
stated that he had never received a penny in return. 
After his death, when it became known that the widow 
would not carry on the settlement, the agents and 
colonists obeyed her injunction to shift for them- 
selves by looting the entire property. Francis Nor- 
ton, who lived in the "Great House" at Piscataqua, 
and acted as agent in charge of the plantation of a 
thousand acres of cleared and improved land, drove 
a hundred head of Danish cattle to Boston, sold them 
for £25 a head, and settled at Charlestown with his 
profits. The other agents and servants followed his 
example, taking everything movable, even to the 
brass guns from the fort, and dividing the lands among 
themselves. Thomas Wannerton, another agent, 
seized large quantities of supplies and ammunition 
and ^old them to the French at Port Royal in 1644. 
All this occurred prior to 1650, and during the 
minority of Robert Tufton Mason. When he became 
legally qualified to care for his interests the state of 



public affairs in England during the period of the 
Commonwealth and the Protectorate afforded him 
no opportunity to regain possession of his property, 
and it was not until after the Restoration that any 
effective legal measures could be taken. 

Mason's first task was to clear his province of the 
encroachments of the government of Massachusetts, 
which had not onlj'' granted lands within his domain, 
but had exercised political jurisdiction over the New 
Hampshire settlements for several years. The fact 
that the Massachusetts government was extended over 
the New Hampshire towns at their own solicitation 
did not effect Mason's property rights. In answer 
to his petition of 1660 the Crown reaffirmed his title, 
but there was no other result. Again in 1675 he peti- 
tioned the Crown for relief, and the result was the 
complete separation of the two provinces by the 
appointment of John Cutt as President of New 
Hampshire in 1679, and the establishment of a com- 
plete form of government within that province, 
M.assachusetts at the same time receiving perem.ptory 
orders to keep within her own territorial limits. 

Having accomplished this most important begin- 
ning, and secured the official recognition of his title. 
Mason came to New Hampshire with his famiily, set- 
tled in Newcastle, took his seat in Cranfield's council, 
and began strenuous efforts to recover possession of 
his lands by bringing suits in ejectment against those 
whom he found in possession, their only title being 
derived from the squatter's title of the early settlers 
who had taken possession of the lands as well as the 
goods of Capt. John Mason after his death in 1635. 
In these operations Robert Mason had the support 
of the Lieutenant-Governor and that of the King. 
The influence of Cranfield in New Hampshire, how- 
ever, was less than his authority, and this was not 
always respected. Judgment was secured in some 
cases, but public sentiment was hostile to the Mason- 
ian title, and eviction was resisted. 



8 

Although during all the years of controversy over 
the title to the Province of New Hampshire the 
Masonian claimants seemed to have the favor of the 
Crown, Robert Mason made an offer to the King in 
1682 which was apparently intended to strengthen 
and firmly establish the Royal good-will towards his 
cause. Being, as he says, "fully sensible of y^ ad- 
vantages that will arise unto me in p''ticular by the 
influence of yo'' Ma*^ Royall protection & Governm* 
as well as unto all other of your Ma*^ Subjects in that 
province who have been so lately relieved by yo' 
Ma*^ great grace & favour from y^ oppression of 
their neighbours," he offered to the King for the sup- 
port of Lieutenant-Governor Cranfield in New Hamp- 
shire one fifth of all the rents, revenues, and other 
profits arising "as well in that p't of y® Province now 
under your Ma*^ obedience as in that other p''t 
hitherto unjustly detained from your Ma*^ and 
myself by y*' Gov' & Comp* of y** Massachusetts 
Bay"; and he also surrendered to the King all fines 
and forfeitures accruing in his domain, which he 
claimed as of right belonging to him under the terms 
of the original grant. 

This offer, read in Privy Council, Jan. 23, 1681-2, 
was not so generous as it appeared, for the rents and 
revenues which Mason was able to collect were insig- 
nificant in their total value at best. The fines and 
forfeitures might have easily amounted to a con- 
siderable sum, but it is not clear that Mason's right 
to them as lord of the soil was good in the absence 
of a Royal charter in addition to the grant received 
by his grandfather. The inhabitants whom he found 
settled and established in New Hampshire claimed 
the land by purchase or inheritance from those who 
had occupied nearly fifty years without challenge of 
their title, and although the courts, being of Royal 
appointment, upheld the Masonian title, the settlers 
generally refused to pay rents to Mason. 

Robert Mason died in Esopus, N. Y., in 1688, leav- 



ing two sons, John and Robert. Not caring to take 
up residence in New Hampshire and assume the bur- 
den of their father's unprofitable attempts to evict 
angry settlers and recover the estate by the tedious 
and expensive process of law, they sold the entire 
Province of New Hampshire, also Masonia, Mariana, 
Isle Mason, and Laconia for £2,750 to Samuel Allen, 
a merchant of London, by a deed dated Apr. 27, 
1691. In this deed these towns are mentioned as 
being within the Masonian bounds: Portsmouth, 
Hampton, Dover, Exeter, Little Harbor, Greenland, 
Salisbury, Old Salisbury, Concord, Sudbury, Redding, 
Billerica, Gloucester, Cape Ann's Town, Ipswich, 
Wenham, Newbury, Rowley, Haverhill, Andover, 
Bass Town, and Woburn. Only £1,250 of the pur- 
chase price was ever paid. 

Allen was commissioned Governor of New Hamp- 
shire, and John Usher Lieutenant-Governor, Mar. 1, 
1691-2. Usher was a Boston stationer, and Allen's 
son-in-law. In 1701 Allen mortgaged the province 
to Usher for £1,500. Allen continued the course 
begun by Robert Mason, to establish title to the 
settled lands by course of law, and so to build up a 
rent roll which should yield an adequate return from 
his investment. The most famous of these suits 
was that of Mason v. Waldron, brought in 1683, 
continued as Allen v. Waldron by Samuel Allen, and 
after his death by his son, Thomas Allen, which was 
decided in 1707 for the defendant. 

When the Mason claim became the Allen claim it 
continued to receive the support of the Crown, but 
the Assembly, elected representatives of the people, 
and including in their number many whose lands 
were subject to the claim, refused to agree to any 
measures tending to invalidate their titles. They 
recognized Allen's title to the unsettled portions of 
the province, but not to the towns which they had 
settled and defended by a great expenditure of money 
and lives. In this position they were upheld by an 



10 

opinion of Sir Edward Northey, Attorney-General 
of England, who advised Queen Anne not to interfere 
with the lands in possession of inhabitants, holding 
their title good by right of possession. In accordance 
with a vote of the Council and Assembly a convention 
of representatives, specially elected, was held May 3, 
1705, to devise methods for a settlement of the dis- 
pute. The convention recognized Allen's title to all 
lands outside of the towns of Portsmouth, Hampton, 
Dover, Exeter, Newcastle, and Kingston, and pro- 
posed that if Allen would give the inhabitants of 
these towns warrantee deeds of their lands they 
would lay out to him 500 acres in Portsmouth and 
Newcastle, 1,500 acres in each of the towns of Dover 
and Exeter, and 1,500 acres in Hampton and Kings- 
ton together; also they were to pay Allen £2,000, 
and all suits were to be withdrawn ; all these conditions 
to be subject to the approval of the Crown. Allen's 
death the next day, however, prevented the further 
consideration of this proposition. 

Samuel Allen died May 4, 1705, and his rights 
passed to his only son, Thomas Allen. He died in 
1715, and the Allen contest waned. The Allen title 
was disputed by the colonists on the ground that the 
Masonian entail was docked in the courts of England, 
which course they claimed to be invalid because at 
the time sufficient courts existed in New Hampshire, 
whose jurisdiction could not be denied. It was held 
that Allen's interest, therefore, could be only a life 
interest. This point was not brought to a legal 
decision, but the Allen contest was allowed to lapse. 
With it went the Hobby claim, which was created by 
the sale of half the Province to Sir Charles Hobby by 
Thomas Allen in 1706. 

In the meantime John Tufton Mason, oldest heir 
in tail of Capt. John Mason, died unmarried in Vir- 
ginia, and his brother Robert succeeded to the estate. 
He married Katherine Wiggin, and was lost at sea, 
in 1696, leaving a son John, who died in Havana in 



11 

1718, leaving a son John, born in Boston Apr. 29, 
1713. This was the John Tufton Mason who finally 
recovered title and possession of the Masonian grants, 
and sold his rights to the Masonian Propriety and to 
the Massachusetts Bay. 

It is quite probable that the Masonian title would 
not have been revived as it was in 1738, after twelve 
years of absolute silence in the official archives of 
New Hampshire following John Hobb^'-'s appeal to the 
Council in behalf of his father's interests in 1726, 
when he was dismissed with the advice that he use 
the facilities offered by the courts of law for the adju- 
dication of his claim, had it not been for the approach- 
ing settlement of the boundary between New Hamp- 
shire and Massachusetts, which had been in dispute 
for more than half a century. John Tufton Mason 
had arrived at legal age five years before, and had 
shown no inclination to test his title. He called 
himself as ''of Boston, mariner," and was unknown 
to public life. After the Boundary Line Com- 
missioners had rendered their decision in September, 
1737, and both provinces had appealed to the Crown, 
Massachusetts called to mind the Masonian title, 
with its possible bearing on the case. An opinion 
was secured from John Read and Robert Auchmuty 
of Boston in June, 1738, that the sale to Allen did not 
affect the title on account of the entail, which was not 
legally docked, and that Mason was sole and legal 
owner of the lands of the Province of New Hampshire. 
On the 1st of July Mason executed a deed to William 
Dudley, Samuel Welles, Thomas Berry, Benjamin 
Lynde, Jr., Benjamin Prescott, John Read, Thomas 
Cushing, and Thomas Hutchinson, agents for Mass- 
achusetts Bay, by which, in consideration of £500, 
he accepted and confirmed the boundary line estab- 
lished by Charles II in 1677, which was the line follow- 
ing the Merrimack river to the headwaters at a dis- 
tance of three miles north, and quitclaimed to the 
inhabitants and proprietors thereof all his right to 



12 

such parts of the towns of Salisbury, Amesbury, 
Haverhill, Methuen, and Dracut as extended to the 
north of that line. This territory was estimated at 
23,675 acres. By this instrument Mason also agreed 
to proceed to London at the expense of Massachu- 
setts, and there, under the direction of the Massa- 
chusetts agents, to do everything in his power to 
secure the establishment of the line as claimed by that 
province. 

Francis Wilks, Massachusetts agent in London, 
writing to Secretary Willard Sept. 18, 1738, says: 
"The Affair of M"" Masons Claim may be very Ser- 
viceable to the Province. The Lawyers being out of 
Town we have not as yet had Opportunity to advise 
about it, but you may depend everything shall be 
Improved to the best Advantage." In another letter 
Feb. 9, 1738-9, he says, "As to the Business of John 
Tufton Mason We got his Case Stated, & laid before 
the King's Solicitor General, our Counsel, to be by 
him maturely considered, after what manner & how 
his Case might be set on foot and introduc'd so as 
to be of Service to our Cause, who upon the whole 
affair would by no means Advise to our Exhibiting 
any Petition or Memorial at all, in any thing relating 
to him, for that the Lords would certainly look upon 
it in no other light than as an Artifice, trumpt up to 
puzzle & perplex the great Cause; And therefore, as 
it was uncertain how long it would be before we should 
be able to bring things to an Issue, we judg'd it un- 
necessary to keep him here at a certain Expense to 
the Province, but that it would be most for their 
Interest to dismiss him, that he might return as soon 
as conveniently he could to New England, which 
Accordingly we have done, after taking his receipt 
for what money we Supply'd him with, which Am- 
ounts to £92.9.0." 

It may be assumed, with reason and with a certain 
amount of evidence, that Mason was offended and 
angered by the unceremonious manner in which he 



13 

was to be shipped back home without being allowed 
to appear in the famous case, to be pointed out in 
London as the lord of an entire province in America. 
He did not return to New England at once, but fell 
into the hands of John Thomlinson, the New Hamp- 
shire agent in the boundary case, one of the shrewdest 
and ablest men in London, who did not fail to appre- 
ciate the opportunity offered to him. On Apr. 6, 
1739, a tripartite agreement was executed between 
Mason of the first part, John Rindge, Theodore Atkin- 
son, Andrew Wiggin, George Jaffrey, and Benning 
Wentworth, all of New Hampshire, of the second 
part, and Thomlinson of the third part, wherein 
Mason agreed that in consideration of the sum of 
£1,000, to be paid him by the government of the 
Province of New Hampshire, or by the parties of the 
second part, within twelve months after New Hamp- 
shire should be declared a distinct and separate gov- 
ernment from the Province of Massachusetts Bay, he 
would convey all his interests in the Province of New 
Hampshire to the said government, or to the parties 
of the second part and other inhabitants then in 
possession of lands in that province; and it was also 
agreed that in all future grants of land within that 
territory Mason was to have a share equal to that of 
any other grantee. Of the parties of the second part 
in this agreement Andrew Wiggin was Speaker of 
the House of Representatives, and all the others were 
members of the Council. 

With this important document in his possession 
Thomlinson proceeded to carry on to a successful 
issue the case of New Hampshire on the appeal to the 
King and Privy Council. The line was established 
by the King's decree in 1741, and Benning Wentworth 
was commissioned Governor of New Hampshire, 
which was thus finally given a political status abso- 
lutely independent of Massachusetts. 

The New Hampshire government failing to come 
to a decision for taking Mason's deed according to the 



14 

tripartite agreement, and the parties of the second 
part wishing to simplify the case by eliminating 
Mason, the entail was properly docked in the New 
Hampshire courts in 1746, a syndicate was formed, 
and on July 30 of that year Mason deeded his province 
for £1,500 to Theodore Atkinson, Richard Wibird, 
John Moffatt, Mark Hunking Wentworth, Samuel 
Moore, Jotham Odiorne, Jr., Joshua Peirce, Nathaniel 
Meserve, George Jaffrey, Jr., John Wentworth, Jr., 
all of Portsmouth, Thomas Wallingford of Somers- 
worth, and Thomas Packer of Greenland. On the 
following day these Masonian Proprietors, as they 
afterwards called themselves, quitclaimed to the 
inhabitants thereof all their rights in the towns of 
Portsmouth, Dover, Exeter, Hampton, Gosport, 
Kingston, Londonderry, Chester, Nottingham, Bar- 
rington, Rochester, Canterbury, Bow, Chichester, 
Epsom, and Barnstead, these being the towns settled 
in accordance with the terms of their various charters, 
and the older towns which had been permanently 
established without charters. Towns in which the 
conditions of settlement had not been fully complied 
with were considered subject to regrant, but in the 
charters afterwards issued by the Proprietors the 
individual settlers who had completed their work 
were invariably included, and in this manner given 
the benefit of their industry. 

These Proprietors were substantial men, members 
of the oldest and best families in the Province, and 
most of them were wealthy and closely connected 
with the government. It may be said, without exag- 
gerating their influence, that they were the Royal 
government of New Hampshire. A bond of kinship 
held them in a close and harmonious association. 

Mark Hunking Wentworth and John Wentworth 
were brothers of Penning Wentworth, Governor of 
the Province at this time. 

Theodore Atkinson married a sister of Mark Hunk- 
ing and John Wentworth. 



15 

Jotham Odiorne, Jr. was a cousin of the wife of 
Mark Hunking Wentworth. 

George Jaffrey was son of a sister of Mark Hunking 
and John Wentworth. 

Richard Wibird's sister married a brother of the 
two Wentworths. 

Thomas Packer married a sister of the two Went- 
worths. His second wife was the mother of John 
Rindge and a daughter of Jotham Odiorne, Sr. 

Joshua Peirce's brother, Daniel Peirce, married a 
sister of John Rindge. 

Samuel Moore married a sister of Joshua and 
Daniel Peirce. 

Nathaniel Meserve married, for his second wife, 
Mary, sister of Jotham Odiorne, Jr., and Jotham 
Odiorne, 3d, married Mary, daughter of Nathaniel 
Meserve. 

John MofTatt and Thomas Wallingford are not 
known to be related to each other or to the others. 

Immediately upon the execution of the deed of 
Mason to the Proprietors, severe criticism arose in 
the Assembly, and the Proprietors were accused of 
depriving the people of the Province of the advantage 
of a most excellent bargain. They replied that the 
opportunity had been before the Assembly for two 
years without result; that they had taken Mason's 
deed to keep the title within the Province; and that 
they were then ready to transfer the lands to the 
government for the amount they had expended, 
though they could realize ten times that sum in other 
ways. But the Council and Assembly and the 
Proprietors, after protracted negotiations, were unable 
to agree on the terms of a deed to the Province, par- 
ticularly as to whether the power of granting these 
lands should rest in the Assembly or in the Crown. 
Two years more were devoted to the endeavor to 
accomplish an agreement between the Council, the 
Assembly, and the Proprietors without result, and the 



16 

members of the syndicate finally met, organized, and 
began to administer their property. 

A form of charter was adopted which contained 
specific requirements for settlement, by which title 
to the land should be acquired, and townships were 
granted on petition of a sufficient number of intending 
settlers. The old towns could no longer provide 
land for their growing population, and the demand 
for new territory was large. It was not until May 14, 
1748, that the Proprietors held their first meeting for 
organization, and within six months they received 
petitions for no less than thirty-one townships. The 
Proprietors were convinced of the futility of any 
further negotiations with the Provincial government. 
They were disgusted with the bickerings of the 
Assembly, who for nine years, or since the execution 
of the tripartite agreement of 1739, had failed to take 
advantage of the opportunity offered them by Mason 
and the Proprietors, but instead had ignored and 
angered Mason, and abused the Proprietors as male- 
factors, who by their wealth and influence were en- 
abled to rob the people by the purchase of the Ma- 
sonian title. 

There were twelve original members of the syndi- 
cate, but the property was held in fifteen shares, 
Theodore Atkinson taking three, Mark Hunking 
Wentworth two, and the other ten mem.bers one 
each. Colonel Atkinson held two extra shares for 
Mason, and Wentworth took another share for his 
brother-in-law, John Rindge, then a minor. Various 
changes afterwards took place by sale and inheri- 
tance. On Sept. 30, 1749, the Proprietors received 
another deed from Mason, which included the land 
southward to the Naumkeag River. 

The Proprietors could convey to settlers only the 
soil. For political rights and the powers of govern- 
ment the grantees were obliged to resort to the 
Province, and acts of incorporation were readily 
obtained when the conditions of settlement had been 



17 

fulfilled. For the return of the money invested, and 
any possible profits, the Proprietors adopted a pecu- 
liar system. Charters were not sold, but each mem- 
ber of the syndicate was given an equal grantee's 
share in every township granted, with the provision 
that their lands should not be subject to taxation 
or assessment until improved by the owners, or by 
some other party holding title from them. What- 
ever profits they may have made arose from the sale 
of these rights. A right was reserved for the first 
settled minister, one for the ministry, and one for a 
school, and it was required that a meeting house 
should be built within ten years. Ample time was 
allowed for settlement, with the reversion to the 
Proprietors of any township or right not settled within 
the specified period. Exceptions were made in case 
of war with the Indians. In many grants a mill- 
right was also reserved. The first township granted by 
the Masonian Proprietors was Goffstown, Dec. 3, 1748. 

During the period of the minority of the last John 
Tufton Mason, and the quiescence of the title, the 
need of new lands becoming imperative, the Royal 
Governor of New Hampshire had begun the chartering 
of townships within the bounds of the Masonian 
grant. Before the settlemxcnt of the boundary with 
Massachusetts, and the separation of the governments 
of the two provinces in 1741, New Hampshire had 
granted thirteen towns within the Masonian grant, 
Kingston, Nottingham, Allenstown, Barrington, Ches- 
ter, Londonderry, Barnstead, Bow, Canterbury, Chi- 
chester, Epsom, Gilmanton, and Kingswood, and had 
incorporated several others. All but two of these 
grants, Kingston (1694) and Kingswood (1737) were 
issued in 1722 and 1727. 

In this same period Massachusetts was equally 
active in New Hampshire territory, but less effective. 
In 1726 a plan w^as instituted in the Assembly to 
protect the northern frontiers from possible incur- 
sions of the Indians by laying out a line of towns from 



18 

Dunstable to Northfield, but disagreements over 
minor details prevented action, and the project was 
abandoned. In 1737 the idea was again brought 
forth, and resulted in the chartering of a north fron- 
tier line of nine towns from Rumford (now Concord) 
on the Merrimack River, to the ''Great Falls" in 
the Connecticut, and a western line of four towns up 
the east side of the Connecticut from Northfield to 
meet the other line. From the Merrimack to the 
Connecticut the towns laid out were Warner (No. 1), 
Bradford (No. 2), Acworth (No. 3), Alstead (No. 4), 
Hopkinton (No. 5), Henniker (No. 6), Hillsborough 
(No. 7), Washington (No. 8), and Lempster (No. 9), 
forming a double line. The west frontier line con- 
sisted of Chesterfield (No. 1), Westmoreland (No. 2), 
Walpole (No. 3), and Charlestown (No. 4). The 
Narragansett townships previously chartered, No. 3 
(Amherst), No. 4 (Goffstown), and No. 5 (Bedford), 
served to connect Dunstable with Rumford, forming 
an eastern frontier. 

The Masonian Proprietors were quite willing to 
waive their interests in all the settled towns within 
their bounds which existed by virtue of charters from 
the government of New Hampshire, but they were 
not disposed to recognize the Massachusetts grants 
in general. A few of them, however, being well estab- 
lished, they confirmed and quitclaimed, and in others 
less advanced they protected individual interests as 
far as possible in their regrants, though some cases of 
complaint inevitably arose. 

Notwithstanding the occasional appearance of the 
ghost of the old Allen claim, the Proprietors success- 
fully carried on their business of granting and settling 
new towns and disposing of their personal holdings 
for nearly forty years. In that time they established 
thirty-seven new towns, many of which, failing of 
settlement by the first body of grantees, were regrant- 
ed; they bestowed upon more energetic grantees 
hundreds of rights which had been forfeited by the 



19 

original holders, both in their own towns, and in those 
chartered by New Hampshire and Massachusetts; 
they placed settlers on their own lands; and they 
received, considered, and answered the innumerable 
questions and complaints which naturally came to 
them from the thousands of settlers under their 
jurisdiction. 

One more important matter affecting the Masonian 
grant was still to be met, considered, and settled. In 
1785 the towns of Lempster and Marlow, whose east 
bounds were affected, protested against the location 
of the westerly bound of the patent. Other towns 
followed, and the matter was brought to the atten- 
tion of the Legislature. It proved to be simply 
another appearance of the old Allen ghost. 

The original grant of New Hampshire to Capt. 
John Mason in 1629 gave him the lands contained 
within a line following up the Merrimack, and then 
westward to a point sixty miles from the sea, a line 
up the Piscataqua, and then northwestward to a 
point sixty miles from the sea, and a line crossing 
over to connect the two terminals. This connecting 
line was always generally understood to be a curved 
line everywhere distant sixty miles from the sea, and 
was so laid out by the Proprietors soon after their 
purchase from Mason. It had never before been 
questioned. The protesting towns insisted that the 
line should be drawn straight from one sixty mile 
terminus to the other, and based their remonstrance 
on the statement that their land titles were clouded 
by the doubt as to the exact location of the line, and 
that thereby their settlements were hindered and their 
progress greatly retarded. The Allen heirs then 
appeared, with Gen, John Sullivan as their attorney, 
and petitioned the Legislature to survey the head- 
line of the Masonian patent. 

The Proprietors did not care to contest the point. 
Their lands were nearly all granted and settled, and 
their business was practically finished. They met a 



20 

committee of the Legislature, agreed on terms, and 
on June 18, 1788, they took a deed from the State of 
all claim to the territory between the straight line 
and the curved line for a consideration of $40,000 
in public securities of the State, and $800 in silver or 
gold. On Jan. 28, 1790, the Allen claimants released 
all their interests to the Proprietors in exchange for 
£5, lawful money, and 8500 acres of waste and scat- 
tered lands, and the Allen ghost was laid forever. 

The Proprietors continued to hold meetings with 
regularity until December, 1807, devoting their 
attention to the disposal of small tracts of land over- 
looked in the original surveys, or forfeited by non- 
compliance with the conditions of settlement. Their 
records show no further meetings until 1846, when a 
meeting was called by a Justice of the Peace, acting 
on a petition of W. H. Y. Hackett, J. W. Peirce, and 
Alexander Ladd, all of Portsmouth, claiming to be 
members of the syndicate. The Proprietors met on 
the 5th of September, when officers were chosen, and 
they adjourned until the 15th, when by-laws were 
adopted and provision made for the continuance of 
the life of the organization. But here the records end. 

The great body of documents, plans, records, and 
miscellaneous papers which accumulated to the 
Proprietors in their long and busy existence fell into 
the hands of Joshua W. Peirce, who was chosen clerk 
at the first meeting of 1846. In the possession of 
Peirce and his descendants these records gradually 
lapsed into oblivion. Nearly fifty years later, or in 
1891, through the sagacity and persistent diplomacy 
of Hon. Ezra S. Stearns, then Secretary of State, they 
were presented to the State of New Hampshire by 
Robert Cutts Peirce, a descendant of the last clerk of 
the Proprietors. The great value and importance of 
these papers, not only in the history of the State but 
in their relation to the land titles of a vast number of 
homes and farms of New Hampshire people, was 
instantly recognized by the administration, and they 



21 

were immediately and most carefully edited and 
printed, filling three volumes of the State's long series 
of published archives. 

New Hampshire owes much to the Mason grant 
and to the Masonian Proprietors. To Capt. John 
Mason's enthusiasm is due the first settlement of 
the Province, and had he lived its permanence and 
prosperity would have been secure. To Robert 
Mason is due the establishment of a separate govern- 
ment for New Hampshire in 1680, and the adjudi- 
cation of the Massachusetts claims of jurisdiction in 
the disputed territory north of the Merrimack. To 
the Proprietors we owe the actual settlement of nearly 
forty towns in what is now the most populous and 
prosperous section of the State. 

The Proprietors were strong men, strong in social 
and political achievement, in executive ability, in 
finance, and in character. They became possessed 
in fee simple of an immense tract of land, estimated 
in their deed as 200,000 acres, but which was in fact 
certainly more than 2,000,000 acres. Waiving en- 
tirely the idea of personal profit, they looked upon 
their estate as a trust for the benefit of the Province, 
and they administered that trust with far-seeing 
wisdom, and with a determined purpose. With all 
their power held in abeyance they did their work 
with tact and diplomacy, and they achieved a success 
which would have been impossible to men of lower 
caste, or less closely identified with all those influences 
which controlled the opinions of the people, the courts, 
and the government. The Masons and the Masonian 
Proprietors made and saved the identity of the 
Province of New Hampshire, and their work was 
good; but it has been forgotten, and the only monu- 
ments to their memory are the granite hills and 
mountains which overlook their ancient domain. 



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